Historical Context

Introduction

The Children of Willesden Lane opens in Vienna, Austria, in 1938—a place and time when it was increasingly dangerous to be a Jew. That year Adolf Hitler and his Nazi party took over Austria. As in Germany, they replaced a democratic government with a dictatorship based on racism and terror. Jews were among the first targets of the new regime. Within weeks of taking over the nation, the Nazis were humiliating and isolating Jews. Some Jews feared that the next step would be annihilation.